Both Meredith and I sent her questioning looks.
"Oh?" Mrs. Somersby said, a note of disbelief still in her voice.
"Yes. I, uh, I think my boyfriend might be cheating on me," Ava answered. I watched her glance at the Earl Grey tea bag sticking out from the top of the woman's cup. "His name is Earl," she said quickly.
I bit my lip to keep from laughing.
"Emmy's been helping me keep tabs on him, but maybe it's time that I hired a professional," Ava said, letting out a sigh.
"That's right," I agreed, forcing a neutral expression. I slid an arm around Ava's shoulders as if trying to comfort her. "Men," I muttered, trying to sound disgusted.
Meredith looked from my friend back to me. After a moment, the older woman nodded. "I understand," she said softly, giving Ava a look of pity. She stooped to retrieve her purse from the ground beside her chair. Then she dug around in the bag, finally producing a business card. "This is the man my husband hired," she said. "I hope you're wrong about your boyfriend, but if not, maybe he can help."
"Thank you," Ava said, giving the woman a sad smile. She took the card and stuffed it into her purse.
Mrs. Somersby picked up her purse and empty teacup and stood. "Now, if you'll excuse me, ladies, I think I need to go lie down." Her eyes met mine. "When Edward returns, I'll ask him to call you about settling the accounts."
Then she turned and walked out of the garden more briskly than I would have thought, given the downtrodden state we'd first found her in.
* * *
"And the Oscar for Best Actress goes to Ava Barnett," I said as we walked back to my Jeep.
She winked and gave me a mock bow on the sidewalk. "I'd like to thank the Academy and my best friend, Emmy Oak," she said with a grin.
"I almost feel bad for lying to Mrs. Somersby," I said, beeping my car open and jumping inside to escape the chilly breeze.
"Almost," Ava said, emphasizing the word as she slipped into the passenger seat beside me. She pulled the card from her purse. "It did get us this."
"You really think the PI found something about Freddie that Edward didn't share with his wife?" I asked, turning the car on and cranking up the heater.
Ava shrugged. "Look, he openly hated Freddie, and he lied about his alibi. I'm thinking chances are 50/50 he lied about the investigator's findings."
"I'm thinking chances are 100% we should leave this to the police," I told her.
But it was useless, as Ava already had her phone out, dialing the number on the card.
"What are you doing?"
"Getting some answers," she said, putting her phone up to her ear.
"Wait—what are you going to say?" I asked, feeling a little anxiety start to form as Ava waited while it rang on the other end.
She shrugged. "I'm an Academy Award winning actress. I'll wing it," she said with a wink.
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.
"Did you just roll your eyes at me?"
Okay, I didn't resist that hard.
"Emmy Oak, I'll have you know—hi, this is Ava Barnett," she said, switching gears midthought as someone picked up on the other end.
Though, as she continued, I realized that someone was actually voicemail.
"I was hoping to speak to a"—Ava looked down at the card again— "Sean Carter about a private matter. Very sensitive. Uh, if he could please call me back as soon as possible, that would be great." I listened to her rattle off her number before hanging up and sending me a shrug. "I guess now we wait?"
"Now," I told her as I pulled away from the curb, "we go grab a hot cup of coffee and mind our own business."
"Geez, you're no fun."
I could tell Ava didn't even try to resist the eye roll she sent me.
* * *
Fifteen minutes later we were settled at our favorite table at the Half Calf, a cute little coffee shop next to Ava's jewelry store that featured a cow jumping over the moon on their signage and made the very best caramel lattes on the planet. I sipped at my cup, which had just cooled off enough to drink without burning the top layer of my tongue as Ava set a plate of their new Crustless Vegetable Quiche in front of me. I was really going for broke with this comfort food thing today. Then again, it was crustless, so low-carb, right?
At least, that's what I told myself as I dug in with gusto. I think I made little moaning noises in the back of my throat as the first tangy, creamy bite hit my tongue.
"I told you it was good, right?" Ava said around an equally large bite that muffled her speech.
I nodded. "Ava for the win."
I watched as she checked her phone for the second time since we'd entered the restaurant.
"No call back from the PI?" I surmised.
She shook her head, chewing thoughtfully. "I wonder…"
"That's never good," I mumbled, going in for another bite.
If she heard me, she ignored it. "You know, what if we're overcomplicating things?"
I shifted in my seat to face her. "How so?"
"Well, a witness saw Freddie walking toward the terrace with a woman in a red dress, right?"
"Right."
"And just a short time later, he's found dead on the terrace. So, wouldn't the most logical assumption be that the woman in red killed him?"
I raised an eyebrow her way. "I'd say that doesn't sound like a bad place to start." I paused. "Not that I'm starting anything."
There went Ava's eyes again, rolling around in her head so far I swear she could see her brain. "Come on, Emmy. You don't really mean that."
"I do. Grant is investigating the death. I trust him."
"That's all very lovey-dovey and cute," Ava said.
I opened my mouth to protest that Grant and I were nether lovey nor dovey, but she didn't give me a chance, running right over me.
"But what about Juliet?" she said.
I bit my lip. "What about her?"
"How hard do you think this is on her in the meantime? I mean, Grant has her down at the police station right now. After she's just lost the love of her life. On her wedding day."
"I know," I conceded. "I feel terrible for her."
"Wouldn't you feel even more terrible if we just let Grant lock her up for a crime she didn't commit?"
I shook my head, wrapping my hands around my cup for suddenly needed warmth. "Grant wouldn't do that. He's good at his job."
"But he's been wrong before," Ava pointed out.
She was right. Grant did have a habit of following the evidence, regardless of the direction it took him in. He was by-the-book, treating everyone as a suspect, and it didn't leave a lot of room for compassion. But I'd never known him to actually send an innocent person to jail.
My warring emotions must have shown on my face, as Ava charged on. "You and I both know Grant has good intentions. But he's not the entire sheriff's office either. If they're set on Juliet, she could end up in a lot of trouble before the truth comes out. And experience a lot of unnecessary heartache."
"I'm not sure there's anything we can do about that," I said.
"Well, for starters, we can find the Lady in Red."
"But we don't know who she is. Or even who she was to Freddie, really."
Ava pursed her lips. "The bridesmaid's boyfriend wasn't able to give any more description of her?"
I shook my head. "Not that Grant shared with me."
"You know, if she was someone Freddie was seeing, there's got to be some record of her in his life. Texts or private messages or something."
"Which would all be on his phone. Which is probably in the possession of the police right now." I gave Ava a pointed look, trying to reiterate my idea to leave this to the authorities.
Which, predictably, she ignored. "Yeah, but the records still have to be somewhere. I mean, everything is in the cloud these days anyway, right?" She picked up her phone. "What was Freddie's cell number?"
"Why?" I asked, even as I pulled my own phone out of my purse and scrolled through my recent cal
ls. I'd dialed his number enough times the day of the wedding that it was easy to spot.
"Because," she said as she punched it into her own phone, "with that we can find out who his cell carrier was."
"I doubt they'd just give you access to his call records," I reasoned, even as I watched her plug his number into the search bar on an internet browser.
"Ah, here it is," she said, turning the screen around so I could see. "And you're right. I'm sure they won't tell me anything. But," she added, clicking a couple of links and putting the phone up to her ear, "they might tell Juliet something."
"Juliet?" I asked, feeling a frown form between my eyebrows as I listened to the faint sound of ringing on the other end of Ava's phone.
Only she didn't have time to explain, as whoever she was calling picked up.
"Yes, hi," she said, her voice taking on a higher pitch than usual. "My name is Juliet Somersby. I'm calling in regards to my fiancé's account."
I stifled a groan. "Really taking this acting thing to heart, huh?" I mumbled.
Again, my best friend ignored me, plowing ahead with her phone conversation.
"His name is Alfred Campbell." She was silent for a moment while someone spoke on the other end of the line. "That's right," she said. "Alfred Campbell. C-A-M-P-B-E-L-L." She sucked in a breath and pushed it out slowly. "I'm afraid I have some horrible news. He tragically passed away recently," she continued, making her voice quake as if she were on the verge of tears.
I had to hand it to her. Maybe she'd missed her calling.
She paused as someone spoke on the other end again, then added, "Thank you for your condolences. Yes, it was very sudden." She heaved an exaggerated sigh. "Anyway, I'm trying to settle Freddie's affairs, but I don't have access to the login information for this account. As I said, it was sudden, and Freddie didn't leave any mention of his passwords lying around."
She held up a pair of crossed fingers in front of her as she listened to the person on the other end.
"A death certificate," she said, looking doubtful for a moment. "Uh, I'm sure I can get one eventually, but, you see the medical examiner still has the body—er, my poor Freddie. I don't know who to contact, and well…I'd hate to tie up payment waiting on all of that?" The last part was said with a lift of a question as she shrugged at me, giving it her best shot.
I shrugged back. It was as good a story as any. I mean, who didn't like to be paid on time?
"Uh-huh?" she said back into the phone, nodding, fingers still crossed. "Right, I understand." Pause. "Yes, if you could reset the password, that would really help me out. I'm just so overwhelmed right now." She choked out a rather convincing sob.
After another brief silence, Ava's face lit up. "Oh, could you?" she gushed into the phone. "That would be wonderful. Thank you so much." She motioned for me to grab something for her to write with.
I pulled a pen and scrap of paper from my purse, handing it to her as she did more nodding into the phone. Then I watched her scrawl down a series of numbers and letters, reading each one back to the operator to double check her information.
"Got it! Thank you again," she said when she'd finished. "You've been so helpful." She hung up and sent me a look of triumph.
"You never cease to amaze me," I told her.
"Thank you. Now, let's find out who Freddie was reaching out and touching."
I shook my head. "Just when I'm in awe of you, you have to pull out the terrible puns."
She stuck her tongue out playfully at me as she pulled up the website of Freddie's carrier again and typed in his number and password. A moment later, she was into his account and had pulled up Freddie's call history, listing the dates and times of any calls he had made or received recently.
I immediately recognized the most frequently listed number. "That's Juliet," I said, tapping the screen. "And that one looks familiar as well," I added, noting another series of digits that showed up often in the log.
I pulled up the list of wedding party numbers I had saved in my phone and cross referenced it with the statement, identifying the frequent number as belonging to Baker Evans.
"What about this one?" Ava asked, pointing to another number that showed up multiple times. "Is that one of the wedding party too?"
I quickly scrolled through. "No. It's not on my list."
"Freddie seems to get an awful lot of calls from this person." She lifted an eyebrow. "San Fran Peninsula area code."
I copied the number into a white pages search and hit Enter. After a couple of clicks through search results, I found it belonged to a woman from Palo Alto.
"Bridget McAllister," I read aloud, staring at the name on the screen. I glanced back at Freddie's call history. In the past month, he'd received at least twenty calls from the woman's number.
"Look, the two most recent calls lasted over ten minutes each. That's not a telemarketer," Ava remarked, skimming her finger down the records. "This one is even in the middle of the night." She sent me a meaningful look.
"You're right," I conceded. This looked an awful lot like Freddie and Bridget were more than just friends. "I think we may have found the other woman."
CHAPTER TEN
"She's originally from Orlando, graduated from Foothill Community College with an AA degree in communications, and she's got 300 friends," Ava said, reading aloud from her phone.
"Are you on her social media?" I asked.
Ava nodded. "It's the fastest way to find out anything about anybody."
"Okay, so please tell me Bridget has professed her undying love to Freddie Campbell on her page."
Ava shrugged. "Not exactly. But if he was seeing her behind Juliet's back, they'd want to keep it on the down low."
"Anything useful on there?" I asked, leaning closer as she perused the profile.
"Well, she likes posting recipes. Here's one for dump cakes." She scrunched up her nose. "Any cake with the word 'dump' in it doesn't sound appealing."
"What else?"
"A couple of cat memes. Some birthday wishes. Oh she's a Capricorn."
"Very suspicious," I joked.
"These are her most recent posts," Ava said, pointing them out.
One was a shared link to a blog about pole dancing for fitness. The second was a DIY article on how to create purses from old, cut up pairs of jeans. And the third was a picture of Bridget with two other women.
All three ladies were standing on a balcony in tight-fitting, low-cut dresses that made me chilly just looking at them. But only Bridget was wearing red.
"That's got to be her!" Ava decided, waving her arms so excitedly she almost knocked over her latte.
"When was this?" I asked, squinting at the small font to read the date.
Ava did the same. "Saturday."
I lifted my eyes to meet Ava's. The day of the wedding that wasn't to be and Freddie's death.
"And check out the caption on this photo," Ava said.
I glanced at the picture again, noticing each woman in it was holding up a glass of red wine as they posed in front of a railing that overlooked the rolling hills of a vineyard. The caption read, "Wine tasting weekend with my best girls."
"Looks like Bridget was in Wine Country this weekend," Ava noted. "And she was wearing red!"
"So you think she crashed the wedding, killed Freddie, and then went wine tasting with her gal pals?"
"It's possible," Ava said, nodding. "I mean, there are probably—what, six wineries that offer tastings within a five mile radius of Oak Valley? She could have easily killed Freddie and then met up with her friends at the next winery down the road."
I glanced back at the photo again. "I wonder if Grant knows about Bridget McAllister."
"Sounds like a great excuse to call him." Ava grinned at me over the top of her cup.
I shook my head, his warnings to stay away from the investigation last night ringing in the back of my mind. "I don't think he's going to appreciate any leads that come from me." I paused. "At least not without some e
vidence behind them."
Ava stabbed her finger at the photo of the red dress. "Evidence!"
"Coincidence," I corrected. "All this says is she went wine tasting in a red dress—not that she was at Oak Valley."
Ava frowned, grabbing her phone and swiping her fingers across the screen again. "Okay, well, how about this." She paused in her scrolling, flipping her phone around to show me the screen. "Look. She just checked in on her page at the Red Duck Winery."
I bit my lip. "That's only a few minutes away."
Ava nodded. "And if she's enjoying her wine like I do on girls' weekends, I bet she's in a chatty mood."
"I don't know…"
But Ava was already gathering our plates and napkins. "Look, we'll just talk. That's it. And if she confesses, well, then you have a great excuse to call Grant."
I'd like to say that last part made no difference in my decision to follow her out the door. Then again, I'd like to say I was a natural blonde who needed no help from Clairol too.
* * *
The Red Duck was originally a small, family run operation much like Oak Valley, though in recent years it had been bought by one of the corporate giants in the region. While the new owners had kept the charming labels with little wooden mallards on them, the winery itself was little more than a tasting room and vineyards—all the actual wine production being done at the corporate headquarters in large vats that mixed grapes from any number of the small vineyards that the company had acquired over the years.
The same wood paneling covered the walls of the tasting room—though now it was whitewashed to a rustic chic feel—the duck themed décor had been ditched in favor of large modern posters of the various varietals their parent company produced, and the old wooden bar had been replaced with a shiny chrome thing that looked like it belonged in a New York nightclub. Overall it had a stark feel that was in direct contrast to the homey atmosphere we tried to cultivate at Oak Valley. Though, as I took in the packed tasting room filled with weekend patrons, I was rethinking that strategy.
"Wow, this place is busy," Ava noted as we wove through the room. "Forgive me for saying it, but I don't hate what they've done with the place."
Marriage, Merlot & Murder (Wine & Dine Mysteries Book 4) Page 10